In a significant development, Angela Merkel’s government has agreed in principle to bolster oversight of the country’s telecoms network but stopped short of banning China’s Huawei from bidding for developing its 5G network.
The move however is likely to make it harder for the Chinese company to maintain its foothold in Europe’s largest market.
According to government sources, Germany will scrutinise the governance and technology of telecom network vendors and will extend this policy to the Radio Access Networks (RAN) which powers next-generation 5G services, in addition to the more sensitive core.
In a report the Handelsblatt daily has cited two sources as saying, following two years of wrangling, Chancellor Angela Merkel’s coalition government has agreed on a formula on how to handle the so-called, high-risk vendors, in Germany’s proposed IT security law.
The compromise however still needs to be drafted into legal text, which Merkel’s cabinet is scheduled to review this November, said Handelsblatt.
Governments across the globe, including those in Europe and in the United States, have begun taking measures to protect their telecom infrastructure from impending security threats posed by Chinese companies and citizens after Beijing passed a law which requires them to aid the state in intelligence gathering.
While Britain has banned Huawei, France is likelly to informally exclude it, and Germany aims to effectively strangle it in red tape.
“The final outcome is the same,” said a senior security official.
Incidentally, all three German mobile network operators, Telefonica Deutschland, Deutsche Telekom, and Vodafone, are clients of China’s Huawei.
References:
reuters.com
The move however is likely to make it harder for the Chinese company to maintain its foothold in Europe’s largest market.
According to government sources, Germany will scrutinise the governance and technology of telecom network vendors and will extend this policy to the Radio Access Networks (RAN) which powers next-generation 5G services, in addition to the more sensitive core.
In a report the Handelsblatt daily has cited two sources as saying, following two years of wrangling, Chancellor Angela Merkel’s coalition government has agreed on a formula on how to handle the so-called, high-risk vendors, in Germany’s proposed IT security law.
The compromise however still needs to be drafted into legal text, which Merkel’s cabinet is scheduled to review this November, said Handelsblatt.
Governments across the globe, including those in Europe and in the United States, have begun taking measures to protect their telecom infrastructure from impending security threats posed by Chinese companies and citizens after Beijing passed a law which requires them to aid the state in intelligence gathering.
While Britain has banned Huawei, France is likelly to informally exclude it, and Germany aims to effectively strangle it in red tape.
“The final outcome is the same,” said a senior security official.
Incidentally, all three German mobile network operators, Telefonica Deutschland, Deutsche Telekom, and Vodafone, are clients of China’s Huawei.
References:
reuters.com
